Merit Aid planning

Paying for College
1

Hi everyone

Our son will be in the class of 2019 but my husband and I are already thinking about the right college fit for him. He’s a bright students, all honors and straight As freshman year in a well-known and very competitive large high school in the Chicago area. Obviously, we don’t know how his GPA or ACT/SAT scores will shake out yet, but I think we can assume that he will have a very strong GPA, many AP classes, and a competitive test scores for the most selective schools. He is enjoying tutoring grade school kids, he’s on the cross country team and the Model UN team, and is an artist who will take AP Studio Art and have a portfolio. We don’t think art is something he will pursue in college as a degree. but would want to use the portfolio to stand out on applications and possibly continue art as a hobby after high school.

Our biggest question revolves around merit aid. We will not receive any need-based aid from any school. (I’ve run the numbers and, with our salary and savings, we will be paying full ride even to the most expensive schools.) We would, however, love to NOT have to pay $70,000 per year and are trying to find good fits for him academically and socially as well as financially. Ideally, we would end up around the $45,000 mark per year or even less if possible. Our son is not interested in really large schools where kids hail mostly from that state. Mid-sized or even small liberal arts colleges are likely to be a better fit. We are ruling out the deep south and anything west of Colorado.

Schools I’ve already put on our list include: Wake Forest, Oberlin, American, GW, Grinnell, University of Richmond, Colorado College, and Davidson. These schools all give merit aid to a decent percentage of incoming freshman. My husband and I both graduated from Northwestern but, given that they give no merit aid, we may not have him apply. Also out are other schools that may be a good fit like Wash U and Carleton because they don’t give any merit and, if we stick to our guns, we don’t want to spend that much.

How can we find out more about how this merit aid is given? Schools’ websites are very vague about how many kids get merit aid and what is considered in the process. Many say “leadership”, etc., but don’t call out exactly how kids are judged or give examples of kids who received these awards. We want to make sure that he sets himself up to be competitive and now is the time to ask since he’s only a freshman. :wink:

Does anyone personal experience with these type of merit aid scholarships? Any advice?

2

I just went through this process. If you private message me, I’ll tell you what we learned.

3

Thank you! Sent you a message.

4

Congrats to your son, he is off to an excellent start.

You are absolutely right in trying to get a list of potential schools to think about, and financial fit is a very valid criteria. It can be maddening to think about how misleading some stats are, like percentage of students who get merit aid, when so many schools inflate those numbers by giving almost everyone $1000 in merit aid, while only a half-dozen get a meaningful percentage.

What matters is whether your S gets enough aid to make it affordable to your family. Just because everyone gets something, or even what the average aid packages work out to be for students who get merit, are really meaningless.

Have you thought about Fordham?

5

I also just sent @april10 a message!

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You may want to start with the maximum you are willing and able to pay per year and know where the money is coming from. Are there other children you need to plan for as well? Then, start running the Net Price Calulators (NPC) at various schools.

You’re familiar with the PSAT test and National Merit?

7

Yes. Familiar with National Merit. His high school gives sophomores the chance to take it as a practice so he will take it this October. We do have a seventh grade daughter so they will overlap for two years of college.

I think we want to stick around $45-50K per year since that’s what we will have saved in college savings accounts. Just not particularly interested in dipping into our investments outside what we’ve saved that’s earmarked for school. I’ve only run two NPCs (NU and Davidson) and they both came back with a big goose egg for aid.

8

Haven’t looked at Fordham, but I don’t see him in NY. He’s young for his grade and a pretty midwestern kind of kid. We’ve been to DC a number of times and he likes it there. My husband and I used to live in NYC and have taken the kids to visit and I think it would just be too overwhelming for him. Thanks for the suggestion though!

9

Other schools to consider: Denison, Kenyon, Lewis and Clark, Macalester

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@Midwest67 do you know any schools where you can enter info on grades, scores, etc on the NPC? NU and Davidson don’t ask for anything but financials.

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Thank you @“Erin’s Dad” . Those schools have come up in conversations around here for sure. Good to know they made sense to you as well.

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@homerdog Some schools award merit based on stats, and it’s transparent. Ex: U Alabama’s Presidential Scholarship for an ACT of 32 & above.

Some schools have competitive merit aid, and there may be minimum requirements (stats), either explicit or understood.

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Anyone have any advice on Wash U or Vanderbilt? Looks like they give around 15% of their kids merit aid but I can’t seem to get any details.

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@Midwest67 Thank you. I did know about Alabama. I think Indiana is the same way. I guess I’m hoping to see if anyone out there has a student who got merit from private schools so that I have an idea of what it takes to be offered that kind of non-transparent merit. If our son has the stats, I’m assuming that’s only the very beginning of what he would need to get merit aid at places like Wake Forest, Davidson, etc.

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Unfortunately most school’s NPCs won’t help with merit aid. There are those schools, such as Alabama, that guarantee amounts based on GPA and test scores. There are a lot more schools that award to the top accepted students, and that varies each year. They can’t tell you anything until they evaluate the applicant pool.

We had no problem with our kids getting merit aid to bring the cost of schools well below your limit, however we were targeting schools that while strong academically don’t have quite as much national name recognition as those on your list.

Realistically for substantial merit aid you want to be in the top 10% or so of the student profile.

16

My D took the guaranteed merit at Alabama, but her best friend chose Wake. She had a near-perfect GPA, 34 ACT, many APs (5s), good ECs, great LORs and is a fantastic writer (I saw her essays and they were quite good). She didn’t get a penny of merit from Wake.

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@“beth’s mom” Thank you. This is exactly the kind of info I’m hoping to get. Need to be realistic in our list. :wink:

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I think merit for both Wash U and Vandy requires a very high SAT/ACT score.

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@“Erin’s Dad” That makes sense considering the acceptance rates at those schools. We are very early in the process but it is eye-opening how important the scores are. It does make me think that, if our son does very well on these tests, that it may still be worth his while to take them more than once to get his scores as high as possible. If he can get a 33 on an ACT, then trying for a 34 or 35 wasn’t my original thought but may come into play. He typically scores very well on standardized tests and has taken the SAT and ACT already through Northwestern’s gifted program.

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Merit aid at WashU and Vandy is extremely, extremely competitive.

At this point, I would not rule out any school, or region, or size of school. Your son will change and grow over the years before this decision has to be made. What may interest him today may not next year. Heck, kids change their minds between fall and spring of senior year!